What the bloody hell did they mean, highest priority?

'Signals through the Admiralty, and you'd better pick up a cypher.'

'Fair enough.'

It was no good asking him. And no good asking Egerton -who'd probably gone home by this time, past midnight.

Macklin was a top briefer and shouldn't be handling this one and they'd used the very circumspect phrase 'highest priority' for a distinctly low-key operation but there was a plane for me, take off in four hours from now, get out of London and head for Hong Kong and stand by for Egerton's signal, the real one that'd trigger the mission he'd got lined up for me, so don't start asking silly questions or they'd say we thought you were keen on going, well you don't have to, be doing it on my own doorstep.

'Fair enough,' I said again and got up.

'You'll be briefed on Mandarin when you get out there.'

'That's the big one?'

'Yes.'

'Who's going to be my director in the field?'

'We don't know.'

'Oh, come on, Macklin -'

'Really,' he said. 'We'll probably fly someone in from Pekin.'

Oh, will you, I thought. There was only one place in Pekin where they could get me a director and that was the Embassy, so they must have a man in place, narrowed it down a bit, I could even find out for myself if I got my phone-numbers right. It was very important and normally it's one of the first things you' re told, Because you can refuse any given director if you don't feel you can work with him: your life's usually involved and you can get someone like Loman, brilliant but desperate for personal kudos, talk you into a suicide bid if it'll get him a medal, it wasn't his fault I'd come out of Tunis alive; or someone like Thornton, totally dependable, pull you out of the gates of hell if he can get there in time, but short on Rusk-think patterns and mission sense and therefore dangerous; you can refuse anyone they want to give you and you don't even have to say why. Otherwise I suppose the insurance company would never stand for it.

Macklin was stifling a yawn, getting another cigarette. I said:

'Been pushing you, have they?'

'I've done my bit today, old boy.'

'Off home now?'

'You bet.'

I said give my love to Marcia; that was his wife.

The security guard used his key and took me in.

'All right Sam,' she told him.

The guard went out, snap-locking the door, 'Long time,' she said.

'Too long.'

She spun the combination, her back to me, touching a hand to her greying hair, waiting for the timer to stop. The auto-destruct warning buzzed and she threw the tumblers, starting on the second combination.

'What was your last one?'

'Third series, seventh.'

The door of the safe swung open and she brought a single sheet across to the table, a Xerox copy in a plastic cover. There were only three cyphers currently available, which explained why Macklin had been working the clock round: there must be some special units overseas, probably Cyprus.

'What's this one?'

'Just come up.'

'Gor blimey.'

It was replacing a whole series. The Bureau hang on to their pet numbers till they're too dog-eared to use, so it could only mean this series had been busted somewhere out there where the signals were hot, and I just hoped it hadn't blown anyone through the roof.

'Fancy,' I said.

The thing was built up with extended-phase digits, sometimes three or four to a numeral, with reverse transfers and the alert provided by omissions in the blanks: you just left out the space between any two phrases and 'forgot' to reverse.

'Have they got someone new?'

'It's Mr Hanbury,' she said rather sharply. We're never terribly impressed with the stuff they give us and it makes them touchy.

I said I'd take it and she picked out a box, small, flat, waterproof, fireproof, neutral grey.

'Any acid,' she said, 'but it takes thirty seconds.'

'All right.' If I worked at it I could probably wipe it out in Rome.

There wasn't anyone in Accounts till someone shot in from next door: its common knowledge that anyone holding up a shadow executive on his way through clearance gets taken to bits and sold as Meccano.

'Sorry, sir.'

'Hell d'you think this place is - MI5?'

I filled in the form: Nothing of value, no next of kin, no messages. TC's for five hundred pounds, a Barclaycard, two hundred in cash, it seemed a lot for the Hong Kong end but maybe it'd have to finance Mandarin as well.

'You can obtain local currency anywhere, sir, day or night.'

'Fair enough. Can I have the rates?'

He gave me the booklet and I put it into the briefcase with the rest of the stuff.

In Firearms they were well on the ball: there'd been a rush on from the mob Macklin had sent out, pack enough submachine-guns on board and you have to leave the navigator behind.

Weapons drawn: none. I'm rather a disappointment to them: they're always wanting people to try out the latest models for them.

Capsules drawn: none.

He'd got them ready in his hand but put them away again in the locked drawer when he saw what I'd entered. They never know what we're going to do and sometimes we don't know ourselves: it depends on so many things: what field you're going into, who your director is, what degree of risk, what info memorized, so forth. Also it's a peculiarly personal thing and involves much more than just life and death: it raises issues like motivation, the will, the threshold of pain, the question of identity itself, what is this thing that's screaming like this and can it remain whole, can it retain command of whatever it is? I used to take capsules with me in the early days but after they'd roughed me up in Leningrad and again in Cairo I realized cyanide wasn't the answer because pain carries its own anaesthetic if you can hold on for the first few stages and they can't get anything out of you if you're unconscious or a gibbering idiot and they know that - or at least the professionals do, and they're the people we're usually up against.